I sailed in the teak-built ketch, the Minota, on a
blackbirding cruise to Malaita, and I took my wife along.
There is wild talk of cannon aboard, and of strange raids and expeditions she may make, ranging from opium smuggling into the States and arms smuggling into China, to
blackbirding and open piracy.
I had had some experience in
blackbirding before I went pearling in the Paumotus.
In so doing, we shall confirm the correctness of Kirby J's suggestion in Kartinyeriv Commonwealth (9) that the races power may really have been based on 'the unhappy experiences of Queensland with '
blackbirding", the practice of taking labourers from the Pacific Islands to Queensland to work on the sugar crops and in other agricultural pursuits.
But account also needs to be taken of New Zealand's historical record, including acquiescence in
blackbirding, early greedy imperial ambitions and some significant failures in the early stages of New Zealand administrations in the Pacific, particularly in Samoa.
From the 1860s, the Reform Presbyterians in the south, led by John Paton, vituperated against what they called '
blackbirding', insisting that indentured labourers were not voluntary recruits but victims of kidnap and coercion, and that indenture was tantamount to slavery.
Many of these places included regions across the Pacific that had only recently been associated with "
blackbirding" racialized labour.
Through two sons and five daughters, Tito's descendants include John LeBreton Ross, a supervising engineer on the construction of the Canadian Parliament Buildings, comedian Rich Little, and Henry Clarke Mount who was convicted of mass murder in connection with the infamous '
Blackbirding' voyage of the Australian brig Carl.
I'm particularly thinking of "
Blackbirding on the Hudson," and some of my prose poems.
In "
Blackbirding on the Hudson," the speaker also struggles with the desire to be free from such remembrances.
The quality and detail of Thomas's coverage are especially notable for the following: missionary efforts and their ultimate success in most islands, thickly described for Polynesia; the construction of popular Western images of the Pacific through the voyages and writing of explorers, like James Cook and Jules Dumont d'Urville; the British annexation of Fiji and its historical effects; the impact of firearms, which not only upset former relations between islanders, but on Tahiti and Hawai'i resulted in one chief conquering large regions; France's colonization of the Society Islands, the Marquesas, and New Caledonia; and the story of Rapa Nui ("Easter Island"), including the horrible effects of diseases and forced labor (
blackbirding) in Peru in mines and on plantations.